Whatever AIPAC wants, AIPAC gets and it wants Obama to attack Syria

Israel wants Syrian President Bashar Hafez al-Assad gone and the American Israel Affair Committee (AIPAC) is pressuring Congress to back President Obama’s plan for an illegal war of aggression on another country that has done nothing to the United States.

The New York Times yesterday made clear AIPAC’s desire, then deleted the following two paragraphs from its article:

“Administration officials said the influential American Israel Public Affairs Committee was already at work pressing for military action against the government of Assad, fearing that if Syria escapes American retribution for its use of chemical weapons, Iran might be emboldened in the future to attack Israel. In the House, the majority leader, Eric Cantor of Virginia, the only Jewish Republican in Congress, has long worked to challenge Democrats’ traditional base among Jews.

“One administration official, who, like others, declined to be identified discussing White House strategy, called AIPAC ‘the 800-pound gorilla in the room,’ and said its allies in Congress had to be saying, ‘If the White House is not capable of enforcing this red line’ against the catastrophic use of chemical weapons, ‘we’re in trouble.’”

Interestingly, New York failed to tell the Boston Globe, which it recently sold to Red Sox owner John W. Henry, when it picked up the story from the Times to delete the references to AIPAC.

So, will it be any surprise if Congress green lights Obama lobbing missiles on Syria, despite his, Secretary of State John Kerry’s and their aides’ “proof” based on lies, anecdotes and innuendos that Assad killed innocent Syrians with sarin gas?

The administration’s case for attacking another Middle Eastern country that has done nothing to the US rests on Israeli “intelligence,” according to Wayne Madsen, and tales told by the anti-Assad forces, many of whom that have been labeled “terrorists” by Washington, both within and outside Syria.

Assad may not be a nice guy and many Syrians might be happy to see him go, as Egyptians were happy to see Hosni Mubarak go. Yet, Assad runs a country about as secular as one can get in the Middle East—or did until the US unleashed murderous sectarian factions on Syria—just as Egyptians knew that Mubarak stood between them and an Islamic state. Unlike the hapless Syrians caught up in a civil war that Obama wants to make worse, the Egyptians were able to oust Mohamed Morsi when he lied to them that, as president, he would govern over an Egypt for all the people.

Bashar al-Assad is not a stupid man. He is not only highly education but also a doctor of ophthalmology. Does it make any sense that he would have invited UN weapons inspectors to investigate the chemical weapons attack if he were the one who ordered it?

Unconfirmed reports claim it was Prince Bandar bin Sultan Al Saud, Saudi Arabia intelligence chief, who supplied the rebels with the chemical weapons used in the Ghouta suburb of Damascus.

Saudi Arabia and the other oil rich Persian Gulf kingdoms are aligned with Israel and Turkey in wanting the Assad regime overthrown.

Other than Israel’s interest in ridding itself of an “enemy,” the other regional players, plus Britain and France, have their eyes on pipeline geopolitics. The Guardian reported last Friday that in 2009 “Assad refused to sign a proposed agreement with Qatar that would run a pipeline from the latter’s North field, contiguous with Iran’s South Pars field, through Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Syria and on to Turkey, with a view to supply European markets—albeit crucially bypassing Russia. Assad’s rationale was ‘to protect the interests of [his] Russian ally, which is Europe’s top supplier of natural gas.’”

So now an excuse—any excuse—is needed for attacking Syria. It’s a variation on a theme going back to Vietnam when Lyndon Johnson lied about the Gulf of Tonkin attack; then it was Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction, never mind they were nonexistent, that were going to cause mushroom clouds; and now, the UN weapons inspectors have been played in being directed not to determine who used sarin gas on innocent people, not that Obama needs any stinking real proof of who did it, Israeli intel, anecdotes and innuendo are good enough for him and his warmongering cohorts.

John Kerry even had his Colin Powell moment. Remember when Powell sat before the UN Security Council showing pictures of Saddam’s “mobile weapons labs” to build “biological weapons,” which turned they were probably used to manufacture hydrogen for weather balloons? Kerry referenced a photograph used by the BBC and claimed showed dead Syrian children killed by the effects of chemical weapons he claimed were used by the Assad regime. The only problem is that the photo, taken in 2003, was of dead Iraqis whose bodies were retrieved from mass graves and transported to a school for identification.

Truth is no longer the first casualty of war. Truth is a pre-war casualty. The American people don’t want a war on Syria, but who cares what they want? Obama wants war. AIPAC wants war. Israel wants war. Saudi Arabia, the Gulf kingdoms and Turkey want war. French President Hollande (even though he will now seek parliamentary approval) and the US corporate media are champing at the bit for war. (Any excuse, any lie for war will do.) Only the US Congress now stands between them and a war on Syria.

If Congress says no, Obama may give it the bird and order missiles lobbed on Syria, in keeping with a plan created in 2001 by then Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld’s office. In last Friday’s article, The Guardian noted, ”According to retired NATO Secretary General Wesley Clark, a memo from the Office of the US Secretary of Defense just a few weeks after 9/11 revealed plans to ‘attack and destroy the governments in 7 countries in five years,’ starting with Iraq and moving on to ‘Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Iran.’ In a subsequent interview, Clark argues that this strategy is fundamentally about control of the region’s vast oil and gas resources.”

But what is not mentioned by the corporate media is not only how many innocent Syrians will be killed or maimed in a US attack, but what happens if missiles strike chemical weapons caches. How far will lethal gas clouds spread? How many will be killed or maimed by poisonous gas?

If AIPAC prevails in getting Congress to vote for war on Syria, it won’t be taking us into the Twilight Zone; it will be taking us into the realm of the insane.